I entangled myself in the exposed roots of a tree that lay bleached and heavy on Carter’s Beach. It was an easy walk along its trunk to get there; head to toe. I felt light and peaceful, so I meditated a little.
Along came a fellow (don’t they all?) to puncture my peace. He was gray and leathery with small yellow eyes and several missing teeth. Like a moth to a flame, he couldn’t take his eyes off my face, and he approached steadily.
“Hiya!” His speech was an uncomfortable grumble, as though multi-syllable words had dislodged from his mouth along with his peg-like teeth. “Where ya from?”
He thought I said Canada, and I thought he asked if it was warm in Canada.
“Yes,” I replied, “It’s summer in Canada now.”
“Nah, nah, is thare wimmen in Canada?” He clarified. “Cuz I’m gonna go get me one.”
I didn’t know what else to do but laugh. He was so eager to explain his maleness! Is this inarticulate mess also the Divine Masculine yearning for the Divine Feminine? A fish spewing his sperm into an ovum-laced river is more elegant.
“Wanna have some fun?” he asked.
Although his directness was satisfying, I told him that I was having fun right where I was, thanks. Falling silent, I relaxed against the tree and let my gaze settle peacefully onto the ocean. The rickety fellow eventually left.
When I was in Nimbin, Australia, back in early February, I asked my lover, Mark, what the New Zealand accent was like. He couldn’t really pin down what made their accent different from an Australian accent, but it was, and Mark said that I’d see for myself that all Kiwis are a little weird.
He’s right – they are.
It’s the grandness of the Land of the Long White Cloud1 coupled with a sparse population. There’s air in everything: caught between the snowy alpine peaks, leaking from the crystal-clear night sky, blowing over flat farmland, and bustling in the overly-manicured hedgerows2.
This is what gives Kiwis clarity of perception and an open heart. Air is the element of the heart chakra3.
An excess of the element of air is in their speech, too. Vowels are pronounced differently out of economy: they flatten the ‘e’ and cup their ‘i’ into a ‘u’ to avoid cracking their wind-chapped lips… ‘fush and chups’… Their words are lighter, yet more precise than an Australian’s. Like the Kiwi bird, they are comfortable probing from a distance: to them, space is a tool, not a barrier to intimacy.
Perhaps because people are more rare here, they are more precious. A Kiwi seems weird to a foreigner because Kiwis will make and hold eye contact without hesitation. They skip right over small talk to bravely face uncomfortable emotions and raw truths. Like the wild birds that dominate the animal kingdom here, they don’t know what it’s like to be hunted, so they go where they will (in conversation and in motion) with complete ease and self-confidence. If you find a bird crossing the street in New Zealand, and a car comes speeding towards it, you’ll see that the bird walks to safety at the edge of the road; it does not fly. It’s not worried. It has no fear.
That’s it. That’s what differentiates New Zealanders from the rest of humanity, and that’s why they’re weird. They are beautifully unafraid.
My suspicion is that it’s nature, not nurture. Just imagine being able to stride confidently through long grass without fearing an infectious tick bite, or scaling a cliffside without fearing a hidden rattler in the rocks. There are no snakes, no wolves howling in the night, and no poisonous creatures lurking in dark holes; no lions, tigers, or bears. Kiwis spend their summers shoeless and connected to the Earth: there’s no foot and mouth disease or rabies4 to scare them into sole(soul)-destroying shoes.
If the opposite of fear is love, then the generous New Zealand social system must be a natural extension of their strong sense of security. It’s the safest, kindest, and most honest country in the world, and that’s why it’s so difficult and expensive to achieve residency here.
Kiwis are damn lucky to be born into this majestic land that knows more of love than of fear. I’m lucky to have a chance to experience this authentic, open-hearted way of life. The Regent is the first proper Kiwi that I’ve really gotten to know.
1 https://teara.govt.nz/en/1966/aotearoa
2 Stairway to Heaven, Led Zepplin: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iXQUu5Dti4g